Getting active: building up your stamina

Exercise in general is important to maintaining good physical and emotional health. Especially after stroke. Being active can help reduce fatigue and pain. Exercises can improve your independence and boost your confidence.

It is also a great way to reduce your risk of another stroke by:

• Slowing the clogging up of your arteries
• Keeping your heart healthy
• Lowering your blood pressure
• Stabilising your blood sugar
• Reducing the cholesterol in your blood

We recently developed a stroke recovery exercise programme in collaboration with A Stroke of Luck. They are a charity that specialises in exercise-based stroke recovery.

This exercise programme lasted four weeks. Each week focused on a particular theme, including exercises to build stamina.

Benefits of building your stamina after stroke

Stamina is often associated with having good heart health. This is of course very important. Cardiovascular fitness is vital for your general physical and mental health. But having good stamina is important in all the little things we all do every day.

Improving your stamina can increase how long you are able to be up and about. Or even out and about on a daily or weekly basis. This can increase your independence and confidence.

Having greater stamina can also mean you can exercise or be more active for longer. This means you can work on things like further improving your strength or stability.

Stamina is so important that it was one of the four themes of our latest exercise programme. The programme was developed in collaboration with A Stroke of Luck. They are a charity that specialises in exercise-based stroke recovery.

The videos are available on our website and our YouTube channel.

In week three, viewers were able to join in with some slow punches and trunk rotation stepping up and down from a stair. A few may even have attempted a couple burpees.

Want to try for yourself?

You can choose from three different mobility groups. Not sure which is right for you? Check out our introductory video.

Getting started with stamina training after your stroke

Before starting any new exercise programme, you should always speak with your GP. It can also be a good idea to speak with your physiotherapist and occupational therapist. They may have ideas for exercises you can do and suggestions for supporting any disability you may have.

If you aren't sure where to start, why not see if your local stroke group has any exercise sessions? These could be instructor led aerobics, dance classes, and more.

As mentioned about, you could also try our four-week or 12-week exercise programmes. Both programmes have exercises for different mobility levels. You decide which is right for you. Get started today.

If you’re worried about getting active after stroke, we have some practical tips that may help. This covers everything from advice on managing vision problems to answering some common worries.